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Areas › Focus, starting, and ADHD › Feelings and focus
After years of being told you get things wrong, a low estimate of yourself does not feel like a distortion, it feels like the evidence. So argue with it the slow way. Keep an actual list of things you have handled, including the ones that went only averagely well. Being told you are capable does very little. A list in your own handwriting does more.
'each gains whatever good it has done' (Quran 2:286). What you have managed is counted, even during the stretches when you have stopped counting it.
البقرة
لَا يُكَلِّفُ ٱللَّهُ نَفۡسًا إِلَّا وُسۡعَهَاۚ لَهَا مَا كَسَبَتۡ وَعَلَيۡهَا مَا ٱكۡتَسَبَتۡۗ رَبَّنَا لَا تُؤَاخِذۡنَآ إِن نَّسِينَآ أَوۡ أَخۡطَأۡنَاۚ رَبَّنَا وَلَا تَحۡمِلۡ عَلَيۡنَآ إِصۡرࣰ ا كَمَا حَمَلۡتَهُۥ عَلَى ٱلَّذِينَ مِن قَبۡلِنَاۚ رَبَّنَا وَلَا تُحَمِّلۡنَا مَا لَا طَاقَةَ لَنَا بِهِۦۖ وَٱعۡفُ عَنَّا وَٱغۡفِرۡ لَنَا وَٱرۡحَمۡنَآۚ أَنتَ مَوۡلَىٰنَا فَٱنصُرۡنَا عَلَى ٱلۡقَوۡمِ ٱلۡكَٰفِرِينَ
God does not burden any soul with more than it can bear: each gains whatever good it has done, and suffers its bad- ‘ Lord, do not take us to task if we forget or make mistakes. Lord, do not burden us as You burdened those before us. Lord, do not burden us with more than we have strength to bear. Pardon us, forgive us, and have mercy on us. You are our Protector, so help us against the disbelievers.’
Qur’an 2:286read it in the library
Translation: M.A.S. Abdel Haleem, The Qur'an, Oxford University Press, 2004.
In a study of 124 adults with ADHD, twelve weeks of cognitive behavioural therapy, with or without medication, was assessed on self-esteem and emotional symptoms as well as on the core symptoms. Self worth is treated there as part of what is being treated, not a side effect of treating something else. It is one comparative study, so read it as supportive rather than conclusive.
Pan MR, Huang F, Zhao MJ, Wang YF, Wang YF, Qian QJ. (2019). A comparison of efficacy between cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) and CBT combined with medication in adults with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD).. Psychiatry research doi
Strength of evidence: one line of research. A single study, or a theoretical account.
You can talk yourself out of a belief about your own ability far more easily when there is a record to look at.
Put something small at stake and you turn up more. Groups that charge a token amount get better attendance than free ones, and the same trick works on yourself.
Tell your partner, on a good day, that the things you say at full volume are not a fair record of what you think. Not as an excuse. As information about how you work.
You are allowed more than one feeling about the same thing. Relief and grief when someone dies. Love for a job you would walk out of today. Neither one cancels the other.